For some reason, I have been asked repeatedly to estimate the IQ of Vladimir Nabokov. This is difficult because I usually only estimate the IQs of people I know a lot about and so I would need to do more research to do a quality job.
Still, I figured I could at least provide a very rough preliminary estimate and perhaps revisit the topic later if I learn more relevant details.
According to a list of the ten greatest books of the 20th century, as voted by 125 famous authors, number one and number 10 are both by Nabokov. To have written two of the ten best novels of the 20th century (as voted by his peers), one of them number one, and to be a distinguished writer in more than one language, is strong evidence that Nabokov is the most accomplished writer of the 20th century.
Roughly 8.7 billion people lived some time during the 20th century. Assuming roughly 14% of them were whites, then Nabokov was the most accomplished writer out of 1.22 billion whites. Thus, when it comes to writing accomplishment, Nabokov had a normalized Z score of +6. Popular commenter Misdreavus objected to me assuming accomplishments are normally distributed since they’re clearly not, but I never assume they are normally distributed, I am normalize them, as suggested to me by an incredibly brilliant member of an ultra-high IQ society; and it seems to give reasonable results.
Assuming the correlation between IQ and writing accomplishment is 0.49, and assuming a bivariate normal distribution for the full range of normalized writing accomplishments and IQ, then Nabokov’s expected IQ Z score would be +6(0.49) = +2.94. To convert this to the IQ scale, we simply multiply by 15 and add 100, giving Nabokov an expected IQ of 144 (U.S. white norms), making him likely brighter than 99.8% of white Americans of his generation. To put this figure in perspective, the average white American by definition has an IQ of 100 on white norms. The average doctor, lawyer, PhD and Ivy League undergrad has an IQ in the 120s.
This is a very rough estimate of course, since it’s based on nothing but his writing accomplishments. In other words, if it were possible to have a large sample of people of one in a billion writing accomplishment, 144 would be their average IQ (given the above assumptions).
All I can say with 95% certainty that Nabokov’s IQ was between 118 and 170 with 144 being the single best guess.
I have also been asked to estimate the IQs of a few other writers such as Clark Ashton Smith and James Joyce. My estimate for Joyce would be virtually identical to Nabokov’s since Joyce is probably the second most accomplished writer of the 20th century. Clark Ashton Smith is a more complicated case which I will pursue later.
his most famous book is about a pedophile. so you know he was a moron. yuck. but larry kramer’s Faggots doesn’t mean kramer is a moron. pedophilia is
whole-‘nother-level of perversion and evil.
Lolita is steve shoe’s favorite novel…apparently. http://infoproc.blogspot.com/2013/10/nabokov-on-teaching.html
GUH-ROOOOSSSS.
I’ve never read it, but the fact that Shoe appreciated such a respected work of literature might suggest he has a high verbal IQ in addition to math talent
there’s nothing to appreciate. a pedophile is the lead character. and the book is all about his pedophilia.
great literature can never be on mean subjects. (inter alia mean adj. sense 2 https://ahdictionary.com/word/search.html?q=mean)
my comments are under “Guest” on shoe’s post.
I haven’t read Nabokov, but I’ve read The Luzhin Defence, and I think someone would have to be pretty intelligent to write that novel.
As for pedophilia, it was fashionably clever to subvert “conventional morality” in the mid-20th century, constructing plausibly clever arguments as to why it was all wrong. The leading argument of the day went under the name of Existentialism. Existentialism is all nonsense, of course, but when clever people play a vicious game of smoke and mirrors with logic, it can take other clever people decades to dismantle the illusion that has been created.
there’s nothing to appreciate. a pedophile is the lead character. and the book is all about his pedophilia.
And this was voted the greatest book of the 20th century by 125 famous authors? Disgusting.
maybe the correlation between IQ & liberalism makes some intellectuals tolerant of even the most depraved sexuality
not just tolerant peepee.
[redacted]
the horrible truth is, apparently: a lot of guys are into this. (i, on the other hand, fantasized about my female teachers as much as my fellow students.) snl did a skit on it recently.
[pumpkin person: I redacted the innuendo against known individuals, Dec 29, 2015]
in fact, i was a GTA for a shot while, and my students never “popped into my head” except one who was super flirtatious. nope. i still mostly “thought about” my female professor and a fellow student…who was a little older than the other students i think…but a ko.
look at the young sean connery. he’s “tight”. he actually got better looking with age.
but in general both men and women reach their maximum pulchritude between 25 and 45 in my experience. but there are exceptions. james dean died at 24, and helen mirren wasn’t a sex symbol until she was in her 50s, was she?
of course from an evolutionary pov…
but that’s all bullshit.
because for almost the whole of human “natural history” both men and women died before women went through menopause.
THAT’S THE VERY REASON WHY MENOPAUSE CAN EXIST IN THE FIRST PLACE FUCKTARDS…IT’S TOTALLY UN-ADAPTIVE OTHERWISE…AND IS NOT FOUND IN OTHER MAMMALS. AND IT’S NOT LIKE SOME OLD GEEZER WAS A GREAT “CATCH” UNTIL VERY RECENTLY. OLD DUDES WERE SHITTY HUNTERS.
GET IT?
BUT HEREDITISTS LIKE SHOE SEEM “COGNITIVELY INCAPABLE” OF IMAGINING THAT THE LINEAMENTS OF THE MODERN WORLD ARE NOT THOSE OF THE ANCIENT IN EVERY INSTANCE. THAT IS, THEY HAVE TO IMAGINE THAT ALL OF MODERN SOCIAL PHENOMENA HAS SOME PRE-HISTORICAL HUNTER GATHERER COROLLARY.
they don’t know it, but they do it.
http://www.livescience.com/22574-animals-menopause.html
The animal kingdom is full of strange reproductive strategies, but when it comes to menopause, humans are among the weirdest. In just three species on the planet — humans, killer whales and pilot whales — do females routinely stop breeding years before the end of their lives.
I’m surprised a liberal show like SNL would portray the black guy as the most perverted of all. Shows we’re moving into a post-political correctness era, as symbolized by the rise of Trump.
@Harlequin…can’t recall the other retarded character in commedia dell’arte.
“they” wrote for MONEY.
there’s no such thing as bad publicity.
now i remember…punchinello
oh i get it. never mind.
peregrino’s avatar is a pilgrim.
but looks like a commedia dell’arte “stock character”.
apparently “peregrino” is used in english. but “peregrinations” is more common.
and “peregrino” is portuguese not italian.
@jbb
all fine art is bourgeois decadence.
if it’s about decadent-s, it’s doubly decadent.
genuine socialist realism is a tractor, not a story of “man loves tractor”.
Chartreuse have you seen this paper about GCTA? http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2015/12/17/1520109113.full.pdf
It might be too advanced for you so here’s a blogpost explaining it: http://erlichya.tumblr.com/post/136229998494/discussing-limitations-of-gcta-as-a-solution-to
it might be?
it IS…without some effort on my part…or anyone’s apart from those whose speciality it is.
but it and its criticisms are all ABSURD…
because none of the GCTAs or GWASs have been carried out on the developed world as a whole, let alone the entire world as a whole.
all of them have been on populations with “geographic variance” of LESS THAN 500 miles.
if you want to draw conclusions for the whole of the contemporary developed world you’ll need a random sample from the whole of the contemporary developed world.
DUH!
no studies have done this, afaik, for any psychological trait.
that english satanist lemmy died, one less person to look down on:
Didn’t know about Lemmy’s passing…Poor guy…Or maybe he’s happy in hell
at last i’ve seen The Big Short…for free.
micheal lewis has been shit since his first book, Liar’s Poker, but i had a crush on his wife.
ignoring the plot, the film making…it’s both unconventional and original.
for example: it has a narrator; it intersperses pictures of the real consequences of the mortgage fraud with the fiction-al-ized movie.
i’d wager that it will be nominated for lots of awards and that steve carrell will again be nominated for best actor/supporting actor.
or maybe that’s already happened.
hollywood hates wall street as a competitor for world domination…even though it’s not a contest, wall street wins every time…but loves it as a field dominated by fellow MOTs.
mckay, carell, bale, pitt, etc. it’s a very goyish movie.
So you agree that the criticisms of GCTA are wrong? GCTA still seems like a good tool for the missing heritability problem, the criticism had way to small samples.
no carl…
what i agree with is that i will make the effort to understand GCTA and GWAS when…
and only when…
the studies are on…
random samples from the populations for which the investigators draw or wish to draw conclusions.
only then will it be worth the effort.
currently my intellectual efforts are focused on the problem of portfolio optimization “in the presence of” options.
and btw,
i AM in the 99th percentile of mathematical ability, but i am NOT a mathematical genius. i find math pretty boring, even though i have a degree in it.
statistics (together with mathematics) is a man-made world (like chess, checkers, bridge, poker, etc.),
but not a man-made world…
within…
the physical world.
rather…
it’s a purely mental man-made world.
its “topography” and “built-environment” may roughly correspond to some real phenomena…
BUT!
there is a cognitive bias…
what is it?…
it has no name…afaik…
it is…
the tendency to confuse model with reality…when the model is a very good fit, like QM is for the He atom…but also when the model is only a very approximate fit.
peepee should read kant’s CPR before she get her clito-penis.
my crude, and perhaps wrong, understanding of GWAS is…
there’s a matrix, A, of SNPs or other genetic variants for N subjects.
so the matrix has N columns.
then there’s a vector, or N-tuple, of the phenotype, like IQ, y.
so the question is…
given A and y, what is the vector of “effect sizes” x, such that…
Ax – y
is minimized,
in some sense.
for example,
x is found such that (Ax – y)(Ax – y) is a minimum. that’s the “dot product” of Ax – y and Ax – y.
i haven’t gotten into the math behind GCAT and GWAS, but i could. and because i am not a math genius, it would take some effort. contra peepee, the heritability of IQ is not my primary interest.
oops.
…so the matrix has N rows…
then there’s a vector, or N-tuple, of the phenotype, like IQ, y.
WRONG you drunk fuck!
A has N rows and as many columns as there are genetic variants.
x is an M-tuple, where M = the number of genetic variants.
anyway carl,
inebriated advice on habitual inebriation…from an habitual inebriate…an expert…
one can drink more and more, gradually, such that what would have made him sick in the past doesn’t.
so…
at least from my experience,
alcohol-ism is a fait accompli in one sense.
that is,
everyone who makes an effort, will become an alcoholic, or at least an alcoholic in the most namby-pamby sense.
but of course,
it isn’t a fait accompli in another sense for most people…
is much more devastating,
life destroying…
supposedly.
what’s the difference?
there isn’t a difference…
except “perhaps” for american indians or abos or idk…
that is,
one drinks a certain amount habitually and this certain amount his body adjusts to or “adapts” to.
that is,
drink too much habitually and you become an alcoholic ipso facto.
that is…for a third time,
even if one were forced to drink a lot, he would still become an alcoholic.
…
the threshold for noticeable intoxication may not increase that much, but the threshold for vomiting and falling asleep can increase A LOT.
or at least that has been my experience.
Everyone still agrees that the heritability is still accounted for by common variants and that twin studies are a good estimate of “real” heritability. I don’t see how what you say changes any of that.
who’s everyone?
i will sit up and take notice when the sample is:
1. random people…not twins.
2. is from the entire developed world and the upper strata of the developing world.
until then it’s all meaningless.
multiple studies within single countries showing high h^2 does not imply a high h^2 for the entire world.
DOES NOT.
peepee thinks this high within country h^2 is still significant. i don’t. for one thing, because i know how weird my own country the usa is.
and, btw, plomin has already shown that the usual MZT/DZT estimations of h^2 differ significantly from one region of england to another.
i’m getting my chartreuse on now. peepee can afford it. she should try it. it’s about $75 USD for a regular sized bottle.
a very simple rule of statistics has been ignored by all these people in behavior genetics.
to wit,
if one wishes to say something about human psychology in general, he must sample the whole of humanity, not a small part of it or many small parts of it.
why?
because the total population of the world or of the developed world is not homogeneous in any way. it differs socially, economically, climatically, genetically, etc.
the gold standard is:
1. MZTs carried by randomly selected gestational surrogates.
2. MZTs raised by randomly selected parents.
3. the random selections are made from the entire developed world or the entire world.
this study is un-ethical…it will never be done…
but a GCTA or whatever can come very close to it…close enough to satisfy me.
There’s no doubt Jensen would have agreed that IQ correlates more with environment in the entire World or even just the entire developed World than it does within the U.S.
However Jensen would have probably dismissed this is as the result of extension of range.
In other words, just as range restriction creates spuriously low correlations for the population of interest (people within a single country), extension of range creates a correlation that is spuriously high.
You on the other hand would argue it’s evidence that the Phenotype = Genotype + Environment model is wrong.
and i don’t expect that h^2 will be attenuated to 0.
but i do expect it will be so attenuated that darwin’s fear will be shown to be justified.
If the misery of the poor be caused not by the laws of nature, but by our institutions, great is our sin.
of course, even if the most thoroughgoing hereditists were right, i don’t think the sort of misery of america’s poorest is necessary or justifiable in any way.
jayman and i agree on that.
if you think about it long enough,
you’ll find that whether
1. the hereditists are right, or
2. the sceptics are right…
either way the current system is basically criminal…and survives only because the arguments for it are never made explicit and interrogated explicitly. the only big difference between 1 and 2 is practical, not moral.
that is,
if 1, then eugenics should be the order of the day.
but the current masters of mankind are against that…as it would inevitably lead to scandinavian socialism…the guy in the gutter isn’t in the gutter because he’s genetically inferior…he’s just been very un-lucky.
the current criminal regime which controls the world thrives on ambiguity and a systematic exclusion of the real issues from public debate.
as gillian tett has said, “they control the cognitive map.”
what tett didn’t say, is that the exclusion from open debate of issues like behavior genetics also keeps things very VAGUE.
that is, it is not only an assertion of a certain “cognitive map”, but an intentional keeping vague of everything else…there be dragons…so to say.
tett is being too charitable to the ideologists and their masters.
their map is really not a map at all. it’s just a language game. or a “discourse”.
it doesn’t even represent a possible reality….or represent anything…because when scrutinized it is always shown to be self-contradictory.
it’s purpose is to maintain the power and wealth of those with power and wealth. it’s just jive.
i’m not sure peepee.
i think if “the whole world” were limited to countries with roughly the same mean IQ and roughly the same within country h^2, then an attenuation in h^2 would imply that P = G + E is wrong…
or rather just a local approximation of the P(G, E) surface, which is not planar at a global level.
i take that back. i am sure of what i say above.
the variance in E might come from different sources in different places, but the “masking effect” of G would be no greater. that is, one would expect global h^2 to be exactly the same as within country h^2, even though the sources of variation in E were much more variegated.
that’s why i suggested such a study could be fairly limited to the developed world and the upper strata of the developing world.
but would not fairly include the whole world as i expect that the less strident and less stupid hereditists admit that being raised in a shanty town with no running water, no electricity, no school, etc., is going to depress IQ relative to those in the developed world.
but many people in the developing world, the relatively rich, live a lifestyle like most do in the developed world, some much better, and they too should be included.
yes. what i said is all correct.
suppose one MZT is gestated and raised in spain and another on a namibian cattle ranch.
then you have P1 = G + E1 for the first twin and P2 = G + E2 for the second twin.
but because the mean IQ in both environments is ex hypothesi the same, and the h^2 is the same, then the difference |P1 – P2| is going to have the same distribution as if both twins had been raised in spain or both in namibia. and the distribution of the difference follows from h^2 and vice versa.
that is, assuming the P = G + E model.
two uncorrelated selection from the same E random variable is indistinguishable in its effect on P from samples from two different variables, E1 and E2, if the expectation of P is the same and the h^2 is the same…or the variance in E1 and E2 is the same…which is the same thing. 😉
…two uncorrelated selections…
It would be an interesting study.
Participants could either be tested on tests that attempt to minimize culture or on versions of the WAIS adapted to their country (for example there are German versions of the WAIS, French versions, Japanese versions etc) and statistically equated if necessary. Comparing the heritability of verbal and performance would be especially interesting in this context.
Alternatively, one could include the entire world (not just the developed world) and then adjust for extension of environmental range. Of course that implies environment can be measured on a single linear scale, but that’s exactly what the P = G + E model implies, I believe
As you’ve pointed out, there are identical twins that have been raised in different countries, even different continents.
Of course they shared the same prenatal environment, which might matter more internationally than it does locally
Yea, but you all left out the most important part: he wrote his greatest books in a language that wasn’t even his own! He natively spoke Russian and didn’t learn English until fairly late in life (if I remember correctly). So one has to factor in the ability to completely master a second language. Not many people can write internationally-acclaimed novels in a second language.
Nevermind, I checked Wikipedia, and though he did grow up in Russia, he was trilingual in English, French and Russian from an early age. But it still must count for something.
He also wrote a book on chess strategy, which must mean something.
He also wrote a book on chess strategy, which must mean something.
I was originally going to try to estimate his IQ using both writing achievement and chess achievement, but I couldn’t find much evidence for chess achievement.
I’m sure there’s research on the correlation between verbal IQ and second language mastery. If a person has 1 in a billion level ability in one language, what’s the likelihood they’ll have the same level of accomplishment in a second language?
I would like that, but I may have already seen the paper since I blogged about chess and IQ before:
https://pumpkinperson.com/2015/05/30/chess-iq/
I realize chess achievement is a sign of high IQ, however I can’t find evidence that Nabokov was exceptional at chess. Writing a chess book != being good at chess.
Thanks for the link JBB!
I also just found out that high achievement in multiple languages isn’t as rare as I thought: both Joseph Conrad and Joseph Brodsky initially spoke and wrote in languages other than English (Polish and Russian, respectively) before becoming famous English writers.
But it’s still pretty impressive.
“For some reason, I have been asked repeatedly to estimate the IQ of Vladimir Nabokov. This is difficult because I usually only estimate the IQs of people I know a lot about and so I would need to do more research to do a quality job.
Still, I figured I could at least provide a very rough preliminary estimate and perhaps revisit the topic later if I learn more relevant details.”
“All I can say with 95% certainty that Nabokov’s IQ was between 118 and 170 with 144 being the single best guess.”
[b]Qualitative Assessment.[/b]
[B]Bold[/B]
Bolding in wordpress is a little different from some forums.
You put a b and /b inside brackets that look like this: <
Not like this: [
To italicize you use an i instead of b
I reversed the equation I found on Wikipedia to find my mental age.
I used my (g) score rather than Full Scale IQ
(mental age ÷ Physical age) × 100 = IQ
mental age = physical age × (IQ ÷ 100)
my mental age is 36.4
I am 28 physicaly
thanks, the reason I requested was that an old 160+ acquaintance of mine mentioned in passing that v.n. was was one of the smartest people he’s found, period.
How does one estimates one’s IQ? By profession, by achievement???
The most common ways are occupation and education, though I’ve added a lot of other variables like head size, political views, weight/height ratio etc:
https://pumpkinperson.com/2015/05/17/revised-formula-for-estimating-iq-from-bio-demographics/
For someone like Nabokov, I don’t know a lot about him so I just estimate his IQ from the indicator that is most salient: his writing achievements.
A lot of blacks have big heads like East Asians, except they have elongated skulls. Many blacks are also tall. But of course, their general occupations don’t reflect any high intelligence. The sad state of affairs for many black americans is that they are dumber now. Many of them were great jazz musicians and blues guitarists of the past. People with average IQ cannot become impressive instrumentalists..
A lot of blacks have big heads like East Asians, except they have elongated skulls.
Good observation JS. Blacks have proportionately longer skulls, though Rushton argued that Orientals have more spherical shaped skulls than whites who have more spherical shaped skulls than blacks.
Once again we see the pattern:
Orientals
Whites
Blacks
Rushton argued that spherical shaped skulls have the most volume, and that human skulls became more spherical over evolutionary time.
Dude, just go back read all the previous estimates PP has done already.
“My estimate for Joyce would be virtually identical to Nabokov’s since Joyce is probably the second most accomplished writer of the 20th century.”
I’d say Joyce’s intellect was substantially higher than Nabakov’s and most any other writer of the 20th century. Pretty much every person who worked with him acknowledged his genius even Carl Jung who considered him a functioning schizophrenic. Finnegans Wake is ‘the” achievement of 20th century literature. His lexicon was unmatched and the linguistic wizardry displayed within is literally jaw dropping.
Faulkner was right when he said Joyce was
“electrocuted by the divine fire.He might have been the greatest, but he was electrocuted. He had more talent than he could control.”
http://www.whistlingshade.com/0704/whistler.html
Yes very good review. You do need a lower IQ to actually have a socialization worthy of creating stronger characters.
That is of course, if you believe in characters rather than themes, archetypes and abstractions. Borges, who was another elitist, used symbols and abstractions to get around not being able to paint a picture of a bartender in reasonable manner.
Its a bit dumb to be looking at IQ in relation to art to be fair. Unless you link it specifically to a type of intelligence. For example, musicians are intelligent, but nobody would say Mozart was a genius who could also do differential calc and write great poetry.
So I say ‘musical IQ’.
But, and this is crucial, having a high verbal IQ does not make one a great writer like having high quant makes one a great mathematician, or high musical – a good musician.
The reasons for that are interred in Mr Van Valin’s review and for a myriad other reasons.It is cognition anymore than dancing great in line with music is.
#It is not cognition
Thanks for the reply, Philosopher.
The average literary author comes in at around 120, and probably with a huge verbal/performance split. (Or at least I remember reading this somewhere.)
The average scifi author is probably much smarter than the average literary author.
The key is: having bipolar disorder. Lots of artists have had it.
Did Pill even make sense when he was smart?
I dont think so. Either way life has treated you well buddy. Despite your schizophrenia you got a lot of cool stuff.
Hang in there pal.
You used the proxy of ‘achievement’, never considering that english is not even his first language and that he made a silk purse out of a topic that is a pig’s ear – paedophilia.
Perhaps the authors took that into account in their poll response, but I doubt it. They judged his works relative to other works, not their origination – which ought to add to the achievement or your z score.
Judging IQ from literature in general, particularly fictional and allegorical literature runs into 4 biases/errors:
1. As Robert showed above, one either agrees with the sentiment, topic and ‘mission’ of the author or one does not from the outset, clouding the rest of the work in suspicion and denunciation. Nabokov can hardly leap from the pages and sexplain to Robert the point. Likewise many people find ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ a great piece of lit for fighting racism, when its plainly pedestrian and sermon meant to emboss the Magical Negro Narrative chosen by Zion for yun ‘chirrens and teddy bear anchor them.
2. We are creatures of our times, and judging a fictional work of the early 20th century is irrevocably distraught with bias due to changing social values, cultural changes and so on. I believe most of the last 10 nobel literature winners were diabolical and mainly political choices…but that is the point – they are contemporary affectations. We are the same. I am not interested in many topics due to my acculturation. Borges on the other hand had been punished in likewise manner by the committee due to his fascism. In time, even many of the Nobels in economics will be seen as similarly foolhardy as being relics of their time – people will laugh at Lucas’s liberetardian ideas, but this will be more ‘correct’ due to empirics.
3. To protect one’s legacy among the neurotypical and autists, one must write on topics that don’t alienate as an intellectual. Mathematics doesn’t alienate anyone. But Aquinas does. Or Marx. Oprah goes down like a marshmellow. Nietzsche like a hot dhal. When you survey 100 leading authors, the more extravagant your work, the more likely there will be reservations as time goes on. Even if they are better judges than the general public.
I’m very dubious about where you got the writing ability v IQ correlation from. Writing ability for the above reasons is very subjective, because as Santo can’t understand, language isn’t a lego set to be put together as per decision rule.
Which brings me to the subject of judges – how should they be chosen for something artistic like acting, literature, dance, fashion and so on?….it’s usually political de facto in any case.
But all this means great art doesn’t ‘objectively’ exist. I think aesthetics is certainly one area of philosophy that is hardest to ‘nail down’ and find symmetry in. Which is why Russell avoided it and kicked off the autistic legal studies circle jerk of modern philosophy.
We know a great movie or great song…but there is subjectivity…but its not just a political hack job or rose tinted glasses either.
But why look for a solution to art in the first instance friends? It was never an equation!
I don’t believe Nabokov’s IQ was 144. I think it was probably much higher, at least verbally. You have to read and reread the book, and a review by another gifted author, like Hitches to ‘get it’. Its very rare you will ‘get’ a great work of literature in fiction or poetry or satire without some perspectives….because its such an amorphous thing for one pair of eyes to behold.
And of course, if one is autistic, you will never, ever. ever. Get It.
A book has to serve a functional purpose for the autist. Even the use of satire must be parlayed as the functional educational purpose to cast totalitarianism in a bad light. Art must never concern form, or rumination – but substantive solutions.
Thus many autists will list 1984 as a favourite book. And it is a good book.
But only a type of book.
Hi Pumpkin person. I enjoy your site, though I haven’t read that many posts yet. I know I’m very late to the party but I just found the post and I would like to say two things.
1) Nabokov, FWIW, seemed to also be an accomplished chess puzzle composer. I’m too lazy to search for a link to his most famous puzzle, but I think it’s an important factor aside from the vague fact that he wrote a book on chess strategy.
2) I hope you were being sarcastic/funny when you said that thing about Lolita’s 1st place in that list being disgusting. I know that when you wrote that, you had not read the book, but I’m sure you know that a book being about a pedophile is not problematic any more than a book written about a stamp collector. Lolita is not an endorsement of pedophilia. It just includes it. I’m currently re-reading it and loving it as I did the first time.
Comprehension is the biggest IQ indicator since people like Muggy are narcissists. They prey on people who dont understand.
I otoh expect people to understand…and then comply obvi.